I write, speak, invest, network, and question to stimulate fruitful conversation. Let's talk about human flourishing! It begins with freedom. Holy leisure is the key to human being, freedom and generativity. Please join me in the adventure of realizing Christ!

Practice, Practice, Practice

Why Am I Getting Hit??

Imagine you are standing up and, for some unknown reason, projectiles appear out of nowhere at random intervals. They hit. They hurt. Some you fend off. Some you catch and toss away. You feel a bit sorry for yourself. You didn’t ask for this treatment, don’t deserve it, and certainly don’t enjoy it.

Whoever is behind the madness seems to want to punish you. You ask, but nobody answers the question, “What is going on here?” Wherever you move, the assault continues, so you give up and just take it like a man, offer it up as prayer, stop trying to get away, defend yourself as you can.

Aha!

Now imagine that this is simply batting practice. How foolish you look there, at the plate, your bat at your feet and your “poor me” look on your face. The coach has set the machine to aim at various angles and intervals to give you the practice you need to swing, to hit the ball out of the park, to find the bat’s sweet spot and learn to use it as an extension of your own body to great effect.

Hey, Batter, Batter…

If you will develop this skill, you’ll be hitting for your home team, initiating a delightful run around the bases, scoring points in collaboration with others who have taken the time to practice. You’ll be in the game instead of pointlessly surviving the baseballs of outrageous fortune.

…Swing!

Life comes at you like this. If it seems like an ordeal, like punishment, like unfairness, it may be because you haven’t realized it’s just practice! Pick up your freedom and swing.

Get hit, fail miserably, swing and miss, feel stupid, be lonely, go rest when you’re tired and come back refreshed, let a few balls pass without even trying, remember the team and the thrill of victory, look forward to the after-party, and thank God for all the opportunities each day gives you to practice the skill of freedom!

Blogging About My Talks

A mom is the caretaker of a huge, wonderful, potentially beautiful, critically important place! She, herself, this actual, unique person, is the single most important ‘environment’ in the lives of her children. Like Mary, like the Church, she is an atmosphere. She is an atmosphere of affection. This is not just warm, fuzzy feelings, but […]

This is my most-requested audio – about how we can educate our children well, despite our own inadequacies. The Problem – We must get kids from where they are, to where they need to be; from ‘uneducated’ to ‘educated’. Given the poverty of our own education, we feel asked to do the impossible: build a […]

Some audiences want to cut right to the chase: “Give us practical applications of all your ideas about Sabbath-keeping.” OK – here you go: In this talk I do just that – give concrete, practical ways to dip into the kind of leisure that brings interior equanimity and leaves you more whole, more human, more […]

I prepared this talk for the Heart of a Woman group, in Kansas City, shortly after the suicide of a Catholic mother of ten. It was a shock to me, but not entirely unexpected, as I had known her during the years she struggled with depression and disintegration, despite her devotion to the Church, Christ, […]

For an Apostles of the Interior Life Women’s Retreat, where the theme was “The King Desires Your Beauty,” I prepared this truly interesting talk. Will you believe me when I say that this is another of my favorites?!?! I know, I’ve said that about a lot of these talks, but revisiting them to give a […]

I once asked a friend who calls herself a Jewish-Catholic if it had been hard for her to accept Mary’s role in Salvation History. She laughed and said, “Heck no! Every Sabbath was begun by a Jewish mama’s prayers! I’d have been suspicious if Lord Sabbaoth hadn’t come through a woman.” Jewish women welcomed Sabbath […]

A mom is the caretaker of a huge, wonderful, potentially beautiful, critically important place! She, herself, this actual, unique person, is the single most important ‘environment’ in the lives of her children. Like Mary, like the Church, she is an atmosphere. She is an atmosphere of affection. This is not just warm, fuzzy feelings, but […]

This is my most-requested audio – about how we can educate our children well, despite our own inadequacies. The Problem – We must get kids from where they are, to where they need to be; from ‘uneducated’ to ‘educated’. Given the poverty of our own education, we feel asked to do the impossible: build a […]

I once asked a friend who calls herself a Jewish-Catholic if it had been hard for her to accept Mary’s role in Salvation History. She laughed and said, “Heck no! Every Sabbath was begun by a Jewish mama’s prayers! I’d have been suspicious if Lord Sabbaoth hadn’t come through a woman.” Jewish women welcomed Sabbath […]

Benedictine College hosted a Symposium for Advancing the New Evangelization in 2014. The theme was Transcendentals as Preambles to Faith, and I got to propose my take on that as a paper. Anyone who knows me could probably have bet good money I’d do something ‘three dimensional’ with that, and they’d have won those bets. […]